Chapter Text
Good bye may seem forever. Farewell is like the end, but in my heart is the memory and there you will always be.
~Walt Disney Company
In the years since the death of your mother, there has been only one person you could count on: your elder twin brother, Suzuki. Growing up, you depended on him to protect you and to tell you what to do. That hadn’t changed even now as adults. You even worked for the same company. It may be pitiful, but you were already twenty-six when you finally moved out of his apartment into your own, though it was still close by, about two blocks away. It was a wretch for both you because living in close quarters had helped to alleviate much of the loneliness that filled your daily lives as neither of you had friends outside of YGGDRASIL.
Social pressure was the only reason you moved out as the neighbors were beginning to be a little too vocal in making assumptions about your relationship with each other, and the last thing you wanted was for him to get evicted for being incestuous with his sister (which he was not, because you, the sister in question, would know and just… no). Moving out helped curb the rumors, though they didn’t die out as it was suspicious that neither of you were married nor had a significant other. For Suzuki, it was because he didn’t have much luck with women, while with you it was a personal choice to not become involved with anyone or, god forbid, bring any helpless children into this rotten, toxic world. Though perhaps you did cling too much to your brother to compensate for the loneliness that resulted from your choice.
When YGGDRASIL first came out and Suzuki insisted you join him in that virtual world, he had chosen the form of a lich while you chose the form of an angel in pursuit of the beauty you would never possess yourself. Right from the start, you were a strange two-man party, a lich and an angel, one in it for the adventure and the other along because of the whim of the former.
You quickly gave up playing YGGDRASIL after watching your brother getting repeatedly PKed for being a lich, unable to take just having to stand by as he was killed multiple times. Yes, you were also killed a few times, but nowhere near the frequency he was, and you couldn’t bear to keep watching, but neither did you feel right just abandoning him and exploring YGGDRASIL on your own just because it was would easier, so quitting was the only logical course of action you saw.
However, you did go back to the game about a year or so later after he invited you to join his new guild, Ainz Ooal Gown. Technically, it was for grotesques, but your angel avatar had potential to be heteromorphic, plus you were a working adult, so the majority of his guild voted in favor of your brother’s request to invite his sister. To repay his guild mates, you were polite to everyone who had participated in the vote, whether they had voted in your favor or not. To repay your brother, you took the development of the guild and your avatar seriously.
Strategy was not your strong point, so you let your brother guide the development of your avatar. Since you wanted to be a healer, he helped you become one of the strongest healers out there, regardless of the fact it made your stats lopsided. You didn’t mind your character dying so often as there were times when your support abilities came in handy. You spent a lot of money on the guild as well, almost as much as your brother did, though perhaps in that area you should not have emulated him…
Regardless, ‘Revival Angel’ Momocha was an existence you were happy to indulge in.
Having your elder twin brother as Guild Master Momonga was simply your good fortune.
He hadn’t felt right existing in a wonderful virtual world without his sister because he knew exactly why she gave it up and also knew she wouldn’t excel at it without someone to guide her. He had always guided her in the real world, so extending that to a virtual existence was no hardship for him. No, the hardship would have been the guilt that would have been on his back if his guild mates had voted ‘no’ on him inviting her to join. As he had done this soon after the guild was formed, the guild mates who had voted were those to whom he had spoken about his sister a lot and they voted in favor for a variety of reasons, though a common theme might have been either curiosity or a desire to get him to shut up about his guilt about not having her near.
It felt right being able to contact her without having to log out of the game. The heavy feeling in his heart had finally dissipated after she joined the guild, back within constant reach where he didn’t have to worry about her, about whether or not she was lonely while he was plugged into a virtual world and essentially leaving her alone in their then-still-shared shabby apartment. He was proven right when she later admitted she had been feeling desolately lonely while left staring at his body as he explored YGGDRASIL.
They made friends and eventually their guild numbered forty-one. Nazarick was their shared masterpiece, ten floors of wonders that earned them the rank of ninth of every guild in the entire game. It was the best time of their lives, a beautiful escape from the unpleasant real world that threatened to crush them daily.
If only it could have lasted forever.
Over the years, you could only watch as the friends you and your brother had made quit the game one after another. Each one was a painful experience, though you each had one that hurt the most. For your brother, it was Touch Me’s departure, while for you it was BubblingTeapot’s. The lively guild you had both poured so much time, money and energy into slowly became a ghost town.
For you, as long as Suzuki stayed, there was no question of leaving. This guild and its members were precious to him and he had never been in the practicing of abandoning anything important to him. As long as he breathed, he would devote himself to that place where he and his friends had formed so many happy memories. If he wanted to stay, you would stay with him.
Thus, you were forced to watch him despair as friend after friend left that world, leaving behind an increasingly silent guild. Eventually it was just the two of you left. More than once, you held back tears or wails of frustration as you helped him make the statues for the mausoleum. They weren’t perfect, nowhere close, but they were equipped with the real items of those who had gone and so thirty-nine statues filled that place.
He made Pandora’s Actor, the only NPC he ever made, who could transform into every guild member and would serve as a means of keeping the memory of the guild’s glory alive.
Momonga—Suzuki—was weary. His sister had logged out and gone to bed, leaving him alone as he finished writing Pandora’s Actor’s backstory. He skimmed through the wall of text he had written and reached the bottom. Staring at it for a long moment, his sister crossed his mind and he wrote in one last line of text.
‘Loves Momocha. Will fight against the whole of Nazarick to protect her if need be.’
If only someone like Pandora’s Actor existed.
He wanted her to be safe, after all.
If there was one good thing about everyone leaving, it was that you could spend as much time on the seventh floor as you wanted and only Momonga would ask what you were doing, though in time he stopped after realizing your answer wouldn’t change.
You were looking at Demiurge (gazing, longing).
You could stare at him for hours and not be bored in the least. You wrote grand stories in your head, some of which Peroroncino might be interested in reading and Ulbert Alain Odle might object to. It was futile to love an image, you knew, but you hadn’t cared about that before and you weren’t going to stop now. Luckily, you had able to keep your crush on the guardian of the seventh floor a secret right up until your brother flat out asked why you spent so much time there and that was after thirty-four members had already left. He muttered something about wondering why he hadn’t noticed when he knew that you tended to get crushes on imaginary members of the opposite sex before reminding you not to freely move around Ulbert’s creation, which you promised not to do so.
Despite spending a lot of time staring at him, aside from saying his name from time to time, you actually rarely spoke to the guardian. It was only after YGGDRASIL’s impending shutdown was announced that you finally declared your feelings.
After logging in after work the same day of the announcement, you and Momonga spent a lot of time in the meeting room, sitting at the mostly empty table in shock. You both lamented and screamed about the sheer unfairness of it all. You waited and waited and kept this place up, desperately holding on to hope that someone would come back, and now…!
It wasn’t the first time you cried in the game, nor was it the first time for him.
Later, he drafted an email to send to the remaining players who hadn’t deleted their avatars to invite them back for the last day while you went to the seventh floor. Demiurge, having defaulted to kneeling, was there the same as ever, unchanged and eternal. He was taller than your angel form, a demon with a backstory of extreme cruelty to lesser lifeforms. You took in his form again, paying close attention to every detail of his face as though you could burn the image into your mind forever. You reached out, but you could not feel him when you touched him.
Letting your arm fall away, you felt tears well up in your eyes again.
“Demiurge…”
Your throat closed up and you blinked your eyes shut, feeling tears drip down your face even as your avatar’s face remained frozen. Flexing your hands, you breathed deep for a few moments before pulling yourself together and opening your eyes to gaze upon him once more.
“I lo—“
The words stuck in your throat and you closed your mouth. Swallowing twice, you tried again, pulse racing and feeling foolish for doing it but determined to say it aloud before it was too late for good.
“I love you.”
Silence. Lifting your head, your eyes were met with an unchanged face.
A watery, bitter laugh left your mouth.
Perhaps you should be glad YGGDRASIL was ending.
At least then maybe you and Suzuki could move on with your lives if you weren’t chained to this place any longer.
His sister spent most of the last remaining time on the seventh floor with Ulbert’s NPC Demiurge. He spent the last remaining time slowly touring the various levels of the dungeon, taking a last look at this monument he and his friends had built, the place where he and his sister had had friends for the first time in their lives.
He saw her standing in front of Demiurge and ‘greeted’ Demiurge one last time as he had greeted the other floor guardians. After that, he left them alone.
For the final day, though, they both sat in the meeting room. Three other players stopped by, but only briefly, and HeroHero was the last, tiredly amazed that the place was still standing and thanked them both for their efforts, though his sister demurred in his favor. Their friend did not stay with them until the end.
It was the last day, so he asked his sister if it was okay for him to wield the Guild Weapon. Even if it was just the two of them—had been for years—they still went by majority rule. If she or he said no to the other’s request then it was no and usually stayed no though sometimes they would later change their minds.
She said yes, and he donned his best gear before picking up the Staff of Ainz Ooal Gown. Glancing over at her, he saw that she had equipped her best as well, a splendid angel that hid a wicked surprise. She teleported to fetch Demiurge and would meet him in the throne room. On the way, he brought along the Pleiades. Momocha and Demiurge arrived after he had taken a seat on the Throne of Kings. She didn’t seem to notice the World Item in Albedo’s hands.
She had no idea he had changed Albedo’s settings, unable to let her remain ‘a bitch’ at the end of it all.
The last few seconds were ticking down and soon this part of their lives would be over forever.
23:59:54, 55, 56—
The screen suddenly blackened, startling him. Had his clock been too fast?
Shocked, he pulled off his visor in total blackness. Realizing it was a power outage Suzuki heaved a sigh and slumped in his chair.
“Shit… I hope she at least got to stay until the very end.”
Sure four seconds wasn’t much, but it was the principle of the thing. At least one guild member should be present until the very last second. If this power outage hadn’t interfered then it would have been a guild member and the Guild Master together, loyal to Nazarick until the last moment. Running a hand through his hair, Suzuki decided to look for his cellphone to text his sister and see if this power outage had affected her last moments at Nazarick as well. He hoped it hadn’t.
Regretfully, he set aside his helmet and got up to look for his cellphone.
Glancing at the clock and seeing less than a minute left, you withheld a mournful sigh.
‘Oh, Demiurge… I love you. I love you.’
23:59:48, 49…
You laughed weakly as the last few seconds counted down.
‘I’m glad the last thing I’ll see is you.’
23:59:54, 55…
Unable to bear watching him blip out of existence, you closed your eyes and waited out the final seconds.
‘…Well, I suppose that is that.’
“What happened? What’s going on?”
Momocha, Supreme Being and beloved sister of Guild Master Momonga, sounded confused, irritated and a little gloomy. She was glancing between her wrist and the empty throne where Lord Momonga should have been, and if Demiurge’s eyes weren’t deceiving him, there were tears on her face. His beloved Supreme Being—she who spent hours on the seventh floor admiring him as though he were the Supreme Being instead of her—was shedding tears.
Unacceptable. He must rectify this immediately.
“Lady Momocha.”
“Where is Lord Momonga?”
Lady Momocha startled at the sound of his and Albedo’s voices. She glanced wildly between them, as though unable to decide whom to address first. This did not surprise him, as her esteemed elder brother was the one who handled matters between the guardians. He doubted he was the only guardian to have overheard the other Supreme Beings talking about how Lady Momocha was, perhaps, too dependent on Lord Momonga.
Albedo raised a fair question as their Lord’s sudden absence was troubling, but Lady Momocha was right in front of him and was upset so that had priority. Besides, Lord Momonga was rarely far from his precious younger sister and would no doubt be returning soon.
“Lady Momocha,” he called again, not quite daring to take a step towards her. He felt unease prickle in his guts as she turned wide, frightened eyes on him. “Are you feeling unwell?”
“W-what are you doing?” She took a step back, holding her hands close to her chest. “W-why are you t-talking?”
He bowed immediately. “Forgive me for being presumptuous enough to dare speak to you, Supreme Being! It is true that I have never spoken to you before, as I, a lowly guardian, would never dare to speak directly to our Guild Master’s beloved sister. However, at this time, I cannot remain silent.” He lifted his gaze in concern. “How could I, when you are ill at ease like this?”
“He speaks the truth,” Albedo agreed, taking a step forward but pausing in concern as Lady Momocha reeled away several steps from where she was standing. Concern filtered into Albedo’s voice. “Lady Momocha?”
“Momonga,” she—there was no other word for it—whimpered. The angel called again, louder, glancing wildly around the room, eyes flitting over everyone present as though she had never seen them before. “Momonga! Brother! Where are you?!”
The maids had stood by this point, and Sebas had stood just a moment before they did. They all watched in growing worry as Lady Momocha backed away while calling out for Lord Momonga in increasing terror.
Then, she screamed something that chilled them all down to their bones.
“Did you leave me behind?!”